ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq – Iraq’s Court of Cassation on Thursday upheld the death sentence of Ajaj Ahmed al-Tikriti, a former security official responsible for executing and torturing Kurdish civilians during the Anfal campaign in a notorious southern Iraqi desert prison.

In mid-May, Tikriti, or Hajaj Nugra Salman, was sentenced to death by a Baghdad court following earlier testimony of dozens of Kurdish witnesses and their relatives.

"The Federal Court of Cassation upheld the sentence against Ajaj Ahmed Hardan, after he was convicted of genocide against the victims of the Anfal campaign," the head of the Iraqi Criminal Court Saad al-Lami told state-owned Iraqi News Agency (INA).

Lami added that Tikriti was responsible for “committing genocide against unarmed Kurdish civilians who survived the Anfal campaign” and had also been convicted of “horrific crimes” against detainees at the Nugra Salman prison.

Hajaj, the infamous executioner of Kurds at the notorious detention facility during the Baathist regime’s brutal Anfal campaign, spent around three decades in hiding before eventually being arrested by security forces following a lengthy investigation.

Referring to Hajaj’s convictions, Lami said the prisoners had been subjected to “starvation, deprivation of water, and torture to death,” in addition to the rape of a number of women.

“These acts formed the basis of his conviction."

The Nugra Salman prison, located in the deserts of Muthanna province, is recounted as a place of daily beatings, starvation, and fear by the Kurds who suffered through the Baath era. It is also where Hajaj would torture countless numbers of his victims.

During the brutal Anfal campaign in 1988, which sought to suppress Kurdish resistance against the Baathist regime and saw myriad punitive atrocities perpetrated by former dictator Saddam Hussein's forces against civilian Kurds, thousands of Kurdish men were transported to the Nugra Salman prison, where Hajaj reigned supreme.

The prison held between 6,000 and 8,000 people, according to a Human Rights Watch (HRW) report.

Hajaj’s cases “will be sent to the Presidency for review and the issuance of a presidential decree to ratify the verdict."